This is a theory that’s previously been stated in log/39-normie-hypothesis.gmi, but I think it’s worth expanding on as it’s become very relevant with the recent Reddit shit-show actualizing just how bad that website has gotten along with social media in general. I think the model demonstrate how the ’enshittification’ process is an inevitability with any social media that is run on a venture capital model. An online community can be like a village, where you have familiar faces, collective experiences, shared values and so forth.

This article perfectly explains why large social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, Reddit) are trash.

What you’ll get is a place where everyone is a stranger, where being a jerk is the norm, where there is no sense of belonging, where civility and arguing in good faith is irrelevant because you’re not talking to someone, you’re performing in front of an audience to make the number next to your comment go up so you can briefly feel something that almost resembles belonging and shared values.

  • SkyNTPEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    Interesting take. I’m not sure the stranger part is all that apt, perhaps relevant for Facebook. But Reddit was anonymous from the start, and Reddit implemented social features specifically aimed at deanonimizing…

    I think the mechanisms that harms these communities is just a bit broader. It’s any change that undermine the reasons the community formed in the first place, typically monetisations schemes that start out innocent enough (“we need to cover our operating costs”) and eventually gets corrupted as big money flows in that becomes progressively more divorced from the community and more and more prepackaged so the understanding of where the value exists and the consequences of ignoring it are swept under the rug.

    • LeighOPEnglish
      2·
      2 years ago

      Those are excellent points, and I don’t disagree.

      Still, maybe the vastness of Reddit is what lends itself to that true feeling of anonymity. A place can be anonymous but also small, and so even though you don’t know who’s on the other end, maybe it just feels different? Speculation.